Euro surges close to 1.57 dollars after US jobs report

0 Comments | AFP, June, 2008

LONDON (AFP) — The European single currency jumped close to 1.57 dollars on Friday as traders digested news that the US unemployment rate soared to 5.5 percent in May.

In afternoon European trading, the euro raced as high as 1.5699 dollars. It later stood at 1.5678, up from 1.5590 in New York late on Thursday.

The US unemployment rate jumped unexpectedly by a half percentage point to 5.5 percent last month, the steepest increase in more than two decades, data from the US government's Labor Department showed on Friday.

The US economy shed 49,000 jobs in May, almost twice the number the prior month, to mark the fifth monthly drop in a row.

The unemployment rate was the highest in nearly four years as jobs continued to be lost in construction,...